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Recently I have been watching road test videos from Maple Motors on youtube just for fun.
Maple Motors is in Hendersonville, TN (suburban Nashville) and specializes in 1960's/1970's muscle cars.
Something I have noticed is that 1970 +/-5 Chevelles tend to be priced $10,000 or more higher than your typical
Mustang, Camaro, Cougar, Firebird, Vette etc.
Especially the Big Block SS versions. I am puzzled as to why?
My mom had an SS 1967 Chevelle & it was a nice car but I can't see what makes Chevelles priced as high as they are?
Any ideas?

My step-dad had a green 67' convertible mustang when he married my Mom. He was a great man. He drove a great car, too.

mickey wrote: ↑Mon Nov 29, 2021 4:17 pm Recently I have been watching road test videos from Maple Motors on youtube just for fun.
Maple Motors is in Hendersonville, TN (suburban Nashville) and specializes in 1960's/1970's muscle cars.
Something I have noticed is that 1970 +/-5 Chevelles tend to be priced $10,000 or more higher than your typical
Mustang, Camaro, Cougar, Firebird, Vette etc.
Especially the Big Block SS versions. I am puzzled as to why?
My mom had an SS 1967 Chevelle & it was a nice car but I can't see what makes Chevelles priced as high as they are?
Any ideas?

Probably just the sweet spot ( for sellers ) in the market right now, who knows. I did have a good friend in high school who had a numbers matching 70 chevelle SS with the LS6 454. It was mostly good for burning through tires and large amounts of fuel, and sounded pretty glorious doing it. Going around corners was another story.

I don't notice Chevelles bringing in much more than others, but I am also not paying attention other than looking for a station wagon from that era at times. The only muscle cars I actively look for regularly are 1964 Galaxies and 70-71 Torino/Rancheros.

I do notice the price of any vintage vehicle has almost doubled in 2021 for a basic driver quality car.

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I think "sweet spot" is right. In high school, I had a very fast 64 Impala, and one of my best friends had a slower Chevelle. He planned to "turn it into" an SS, and I suspect most of the SS Chevelles you see advertised were not born with the insignia. But what made the Chevelle SS special back then was that it was faster than most of the muscle cars, but a lot more compact than those that beat it. So yeah, sweet spot, especially with today's smaller parking spaces.

I don't look at cars much anymore and have no idea of values But I did live through the time of muscle cars and had a few. I had a 64 Chevelle (not a SS) back in about 1975 it came with a 283 engine. I had some friends I grew up with that were total gear heads so I bought a crashed 1967 Caprice that had a 396 with a turbo 400 tranny that they put in my 64 Chevelle they also put a shift kit in the tranny and that thing was a monster.

I took this picture from the internet so not my car but sure looks like it.

Not exactly muscle car, but at least muscle-car adjacent: there's a 1971 Buick Riviera in my neighborhood. I admire it every time I pass it, but I don't know that I'd want to have to park it in the city. Maybe if I had a country house and some open roads...

glasshand wrote: ↑Tue Nov 30, 2021 3:11 pm Not exactly muscle car, but at least muscle-car adjacent: there's a 1971 Buick Riviera in my neighborhood. I admire it every time I pass it, but I don't know that I'd want to have to park it in the city. Maybe if I had a country house and some open roads...

I like almost any year Riviera, probably because my dad had a 1986ish, but I love me a Riv.

always a Camaro guy myself, had 3 in my lifetime, own a Vette now. I had a friend with a 68 Chevelle SS, nice car but I'd never pay more for one of those than anything else from that era.

My best guess would be because the pony-cars in your comparison are probably small blocks. Big blocks carry a lot of nostalgia value, especially in an age of downsizing and coming electric vehicles. People who never had one see this as a last chance.

Not as true for Vettes, though - Big blocks weren't such a rarity, especially in the seventies.

I would expect the highest prices to be on big block pony cars. Big blocks were a standard Chevelle option as of about '66. Big block pony cars were more of a rarity, no matter the brand, with the exception of the Trans-Am and possibly the 390 Mustang.

Wonder if the 80s kids reaching midlife crisis are buying up the bigger cars since most of the pony cars/Falcons/Novas/Darts have been outpriced or a lot were made into race cars over the years by the boomers.

A full size is a lot more family friendly while still cool and this decade will likely be the last one where owning a big block won't cost more to drive than car payments on an EV. I am now resigned to the fact that I will not be able to own/drive my dream car in retirement around 2050. That just plain sucks...



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